strategists for both parties in florida agree obama is ahead in the state and the battle over medicare is helping make inroads with seniors. as nancy reported, the president is also doing better with blue collar white voters in ohio and doing better on the economy of the economy. whose happening is mitt romney is having to play defense with his own voting group. the time he has to spend shoring them up is time he's not spending getting swing voters. >> pelley: john, polls that are taken about this point in september sometimes predict the winner and sometimes they don't. in 2008, we had obama over mccain at about this point, but in the year 2000, we had gore over bush about this point. how predictive are these polls six weeks out. >> reporter: if we go all the way back to 1952, eisenhower's first election, the vast majority of the time the candidates who was ahead of the polls ended up winning in the end. but mitt romney can hold on to, though, is that president's john kennedy, ronald reagan, and george w. bush are all tied or behind, scott, and they pulled it out in the end. >> pelley: